Look Both Ways Before You Cross That Line
by x-HotMess
Summary: Of course he loves her, but he'd rather die a thousand painful deaths that he could easily recover from rather than admit it. Nathan/Kelly


_one_

"Sometimes I think I fucking love ya!"

Yeah, well, I think fucking love you too, you crazy, mind-reading chav, Nathan thinks.

But he forgets all about loving her when the car that Jamie's in catches on fire, and with it goes the happiness he'd allowed to bloom in his chest while thinking about the future.

And then he remembers when she hugs him as he's curled up on the futon on the roof and starts to cry. For the one day he felt like he was part of a family that was worth something; that the deadbeat dad and the mother who chose a boyfriend over her own son didn't matter, because he and his brother were going to take on the world together. But know, as usual the universe fucked him over and he was on his own again. But the loneliness and grief ebbs away as he buries his face in her warm collarbone that smells like cheap perfume. With a jolt he realises that he's never let anyone in as much as Kelly, and she's the closest thing to family he's got left, and shit, he really hopes she can't hear that.

_two_

Being in love with Simon was just one big blur of emotions that he can't really remember, but he doesn't think he's ever been so sweet to anyone in his life. He wonders why he couldn't have treated Kelly like that when he finally got the chance to be with her. No, instead he blew it with the only girl he's every properly cared about. He thought it was going well until she said she just wanted to be mates, but I guess it's easy to feel like a romantic when you're knuckle deep in lady pie. He wonders if what he temporarily felt for Simon was the real thing, and if he didn't feel that for Kelly, did he truly love her? Yes, he decides, because not only because of those fantastic tits that he pictures while he's beating off, but the fact that he'd choose her over any other girl every time. All he wants was to give her everything she's ever wanted, make her happy like she deserved to be, but he's got of lot of growing up to do before he can, and he's not quite sure if he can give up being a gobby little shit just yet.

But that doesn't mean he can just stop loving her.

_three_

He knows that when she's kidnapped and strung up on a meat hook in a wedding dress, and the fear that tightens in his chest to see the blood trickling down her face completely overshadows the urge to laugh at her wearing such a poufy white gown that she would never be caught dead wearing anywhere else. His stomach swoops at the thought of her actually dying, and he catches himself in a brief flash of imagining his life without her. But then she's giving him lip and he's internally grumbling about what an ungrateful bint she is. If all she can do is mouth off about them trying to help her then maybe he should just leave her up there. Before you know it he's up on a meat hook too and he gets why she's so pissed. They really do hurt your arms.

_four_

Just because he's in some kind of love with Kelly, doesn't mean he can't appreciate a nice arse when he sees one. And sure, Jessica's cute, but she's also a snooty bitch, and even if she wasn't on a psychopathic murderous rampage, they would never have gone well together. She would've just shit him to tears with her uppity attitude.

_five_

He keeps trying to find Simon to stop him being murdered by his psycho bitch girlfriend, but wandering around the community centre screaming 'Barry!' over and over gets old after a while. The he sees Kelly disappear out the door with some guy in a gorilla costume. A flurry of thoughts whirl up in his brain, ranging from 'that unfeeling bitch doesn't even care about Barry getting his guts strung out,' to 'how dare she be going after some new guy when only weeks ago I had my tongue down her throat.' Indignantly, he followed that yelling policeman, but only realising what he was so worked up about when he saw some strange furry thing climbing the wall of one of the buildings on the estate with Kelly on his back.

Without any idea why, he takes off after them. If anything, he doesn't like that the all the coppers have their guns right at Kelly's back. He gets inside and starts sprinting up the stairs. By the second level he's out of breath and cursing the huge, spongy muscles on his costume that are heavy and itchy on his skin. By the time he gets on the roof he's flustered and terrified because he definitely heard a gunshot, and screams for Kelly when he sees her slumped over. But as he pushes off the police officers, he's flooded with a sense of relief as he sees Kelly hasn't been shot, but rather the gorilla in a gorilla costume that she's cradling in her lap.

It takes him exactly three seconds to figure out what must have happened. Normally he'd laugh, but she's distraught and he doesn't want to make her feel worse, and anyway, who is he to talk, he fucked an 82 year old woman. So he takes her back to the community centre and gets her a beer and points out that a gorilla is actually an ape and not a monkey, because he's shit at being sympathetic and it's the first thing that comes into his head.

_six_

After Curtis tells them what happens if their powers were to be revealed, he's suddenly gripped by a terrifying truth. What if he gets so badly injured that he's permanently brain-damaged, but not dead? Would he be able to come back from that? He turns to Kelly to ask her if she would just kill him if that ever happened, but she's got a faraway frown plastered on her face and the words die in his throat.

Later at the bar, he plonks down next to her and props his chin up on his elbow. "Would you come to my funeral if I died?"

"You've already had a funeral, and I already went, you big idiot. I even put your iPod in your fucking coffin," she peers at him like he's suffering from a mental illness, so no more differently than usual, really.

"But what if I wasn't immortal? Would you still want to be my friend?" he pushes further.

"I don't want to be your friend now," she smirks, taking a sip of beer.

"Now, why would you go and say a nasty thing like that?" he pouts and bats his eyelids at her. "C'mon, don't you love me?"

"It's not because I don't love you, you dick," she rolls her eyes. "You're my best friend. But you need to stop with all this."

"All what?" he grins innocently.

"All this flirting and thinking dirty thoughts about me. I already told you, it's not going to work. Think about the all sexual chemistry people like us need to sustain a good relationship."

"Oh, believe me, I'm nearly always thinking about it," he wiggles his eyebrows suggestively, and she flicks him in the nose.

"I'm serious!" she scolds him over his shriek of pain. "We don't have that sexual chemistry. We have familiarity and friendship and we've mistaken that for something else because we're bored and horny."

There's an extended silence, and he sniffs out of lack of anything else to say. "Yeah, okay. But don't think for one second that you can come whining to me when I don't want you anymore because you didn't take a ride on this disco stick when you had the chance."

"Wanker," Kelly snaps irritably, getting to her feet.

"Hey, Kel?" there's something unspoken lingering in the air between them, and he needs to make it said. "I thought I really did love you, you know. For a while."

"Oh, whatever," she waves him off, uncomfortable with this emotional vulnerability as he is. "Thanks for being my friend anyway, yeah?"

_seven_

Marnie reminds him of Kelly the first time they meet; not put off by his brashness, she retorts with a backhanded comment, but she's more curious than irritated. Kelly initially disliked him, but Marnie just seems to click from the very first second. It is so easy to be with her, he melts under her lips, loses himself in her eyes, and suddenly he feels like he's always belonged with her. Kelly came on gradually, but Marnie was instant, and there was a shift in his world. A sense of responsibility, of purpose, in what had once been his meaningless void of a life. No longer having to navigate the emptiness alone, he pulls Marnie and the baby into him, and glances over at Kelly nervously, unsure of what her reaction might be. But she's just smiling at the tiny figure in Marnie's arm, and a rush of air escapes his lungs, and soon enough she's screaming at him like always and everything is back to normal. For now, anyway. They're buying their powers back tomorrow, which is basically an invitation to turn his life into a shitstorm again. Fucking brilliant.

_eight_

**Misfits is legitimately the best show on television. If you disagree, hey, fuck you.  
****Title comes from Teen Lovers by The Virgins and Sky Ferreira. I thought it was appropriate, because I am so in love with Nathan it is ridiculous.**


End file.
